Volume 1

A general system of chemical knowledge; and its application to the phenomena of nature and art / By A.F. Fourcroy. Translated from the original French, by William Nicholson.

  • Fourcroy, Antoine-François de, comte, 1755-1809.
Date:
1804
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A general system of chemical knowledge; and its application to the phenomena of nature and art / By A.F. Fourcroy. Translated from the original French, by William Nicholson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    12/542 (page 8)
    for 180O5 and Dr. Wollafton s, in the fame colleftion for 1802, on the refraftion and difperfxon of lights are highly interefting, and tend greatly to explain the nature of folar light. It is a queftion which cautious Fhilofo- phers can by no means confider as decided, whether the phenomena of heat and light be caufed by the prefence of fome body or bodies poffefiing peculiar properties,—or by certain motions to which moft, if not all bodies, or their parts, are capable of being fubjefted ; or in other words, whether heat and light, or either of them, do confift in a peculiar matter^ or in a motion, either of the parts of bodies, or of fome generally dif- fufed fluid, fuch as the ether of Newton, &c. Many Chemifts appear to have pro- ceeded with too much rapidity, when they have confidered light and heat as decidedly capable of entering into combination like other bodies, and of being difengaged by the a ft ion ol the affinities. On this extern five fuhjeft it is impoffible to fay much on the prefent occafion. The doflrine of iiglit and heat, as caufed bv, or conhftm (T &